February 09, 2006
Robbie Has a Sister!
Emma Isabella Jakobs was born on 02/07/06 at 3:40 pm, weighing 6lb 2oz, and measuring 18.5 inches. My contractions started at 8 am, just in time to tell Jef it would be a good idea to work from home that day. By 10 am they were constant enough to call the birthing center and we arrived there around noon. The midwife on call, and center owner, Jean Stokes examined me and said that the baby is nice and low and it would be a good idea to walk around for 2 hours to see if that moves the labor along some. At that time my contractions were about 10-12 minutes apart. We drove to the arboretum shopping center and started walking around, within minutes the contractions sped up to being 3-4 minutes apart and more intense. We felt it would be safer to stick closer to the birthing center so we drove back there, and walked around in a grassy area behind their building until 2 pm. At that point Jean checked me again and said that the baby is really low now and I'm 3 cm dialated, as she was feeling the baby, the water broke. She also pressed down on the baby's feet and she slid down another inch. Jean said she'd never seen that happen before. That got me dialated by another 2 inches. We were sent to the birthing room and I walked around there for a bit. Within about an hour the contractions became very intense and Jean checked me again. She said I was 6 cm dialated at that point and suggested getting in the tub with some warm water to see if that would speed things up even more. I got in the tub, and after another 3 contractions or so, I felt a strong urge to push. We called Jean back in the room and she told me to start pushing. After a few pushes the baby came out. The pushing stage only lasted about 3 minutes. Jean was amazed at how quickly and smoothly things went. Apparently I'm built for having big babies, so a little one like Emma had a smooth ride. :)